Concept
Reviewer Deadlines and Reminders
The response and review periods of reviewer invitations, when reminders go out and how unanswered invitations close.
Each invitation has two deadlines. The reviewer responds to the invitation by the response deadline. If they accept, they submit the review by the review deadline. The exact dates are in the invitation and on the Deadlines card of the invitation page.
Default periods
If the editor does not set periods in the invitation, the periods from the site settings apply. By default these are 7 days for the response and 21 days for the review. A system administrator changes them on the Workflow tab of the Administration → Site settings screen.
In an invitation, the response period can be between 1 and 60 days and the review period between 1 and 180 days. Both periods count from the moment the invitation is sent. The review deadline cannot be earlier than the response deadline.
Reminders
- A reviewer who has not responded to the invitation yet is reminded once before the response deadline.
- For an accepted invitation, a reminder goes out before the review deadline.
- If the review is late, the reminders continue at the same interval. At most five review reminders are sent for one invitation.
- A site setting decides how many days before the deadline the reminder goes out. By default this is 3 days.
- Reminders go out only while the review round is open.
The editor sees the number of reminders sent in the row of the invitation.
Unanswered invitations
An invitation that is not answered by the response deadline closes automatically, and its status changes to Expired. The reviewer and the editors of the submission get a notification. An expired invitation can no longer be accepted. The editor can invite the same reviewer again.
Changing the deadlines
Only the editor changes the deadlines. The change is written to the audit log and the reminder counter is reset. The panel has no button for the reviewer to ask for more time. For more time, the reviewer contacts the inviting editor directly.
The editor's steps are in Tracking Invitations and Reviews. For a reviewer who cannot meet the deadline, see I cannot meet the deadline.